Rate the Last Film you Watched

[Fido_le_muet 5,197]

Interstellar

Watched this over two nights because the Mrs can't stay awake for so long 😂

I've been wanting to see it for a while now and thanks to the quarantine, I finally took the time to see it ^^

And it is a fantastic movie. You gotta stay focused though cause it's a bit complicated and there's a lot of scientific stuff that are essential to the plot. It can be a bit hard to follow and having a basic knowledge about space definitely helps. Netflix classed it in the mind-bending category and that is definitely right ! 

I love space. Space is awesome. Space is scary. Space is beautiful. Space is mesmerizing. Space is incredible. Space is dangerous. All of this is perfectly shown in the movie. 

It is a movie about interstellar travel so to do that the story has to start on good old Earth? Turns out Earth is not feeling so good these days (in a near future, 2067 according to Wikipedia). Climate is failing, there are dust storms every other days and nothing grows anymore. Only corn remains. And even that will soon end as it gets worse and worse. Our hero, Cooper is living with his two kids, Tom and Murphy and his father in law. After another dust storm Murphy discovers strange dust patterns on her bedroom floor. She thinks it's a ghost and tells her dad, former NASA pilot turned farmer. Cause apparently, it's all about farming these days. And the current government is even changing history saying that the Apollo moon landings were faked so that the USSR would spend all their money in a fake space race and lose the Cold War. WTF ? 

Anyway, being a man of science, Cooper finds out that the patterns are actually coordinates created by variations of the gravity. Already, you feel that this is gonna be complicated. So micro variations in the gravity lead to a set of geo coordinates. Hmmm I don't see how that could be but I'm no physicist. So Cooper goes to the location, alone. Or so he thinks cause Murphy hid in the car and ends up tagging along. They arrive at a secured government compound and it is revealed that it is a secret NASA Research Facility. Here, they meet Dr Brands, father and daughter. Papa Brand was actually Cooper's boss back in the day. He reveals that gravity anomalies have been happening for the past 48 years, since A FREAKING WORMHOLE appeared near Saturn !!! AWESOME !!! The Professor explains that 'beings' opened it, without anymore explanation. At first I was disappointed by that because I like to have explanations but it's better this way. The revelations continue as he explains that the wormhole leads to another galaxy, that they sent probes through it and even sent 12 scientists on suicide missions to 12 identified worlds that could be habitable. But only 3 sent back interesting data. Based on the data, the professor elaborated 2 plans to save humanity. Plan A is to develop a gravitationnal propulsion engine and organize the transfer of a significant amount of humans (all of them ? Wasn't clear) via his secret facility which is actually an ark of sorts. That means making the biggest physics discovery of all time. Plan B is to send a team to check out the 3 planets and if they prove habitable, colonize it with the 5000 embryos stored in the spacecraft. 

Luckily, Cooper is a former NASA pilot. But first, he has to tell his kids that he's going to space, through a wormhole, basically on a suicide mission and that he's never coming back. And if he miraculously comes back, his kids would likely be dead because of time dilation. Another concept that needs a bit of concentration to understand. But the movie does a great job at explaining this one in a later scene. Long story short, Cooper says goodbye to his kids. He gives her a watch synchronised with his own (important for the ending) but she's pissed and doesn't wanna say goodbye. He leaves Earth with Brand's daughter, 2 other dudes and 2 super smart robots. 2 years later they arrive at Saturn and go through the wormhole. They end up in a new galaxy, near the supermassive black hole of that galaxy. And man that BH is MASSIVE ! It's so huge that they named it Gargantua. Wonderful sight.

They decide to go explore the first planet while one of them stays back in the station to study the BH. That's when the movie explains the time dilation concept. Because they are so close to the black hole, time goes by differently and because of the distance from the station and the planet, one hour on the planet is actually 7 years in the station. So the 3 explorers go visit Planet A. It's an ocean world that proves uninhabitable because the waves are mountain sized and one of them dies before they can go back. When they return after about 3 hours, their friend reveals that they've been gone 23 YEARS !!! I loved that ! SCIENCE ! Science is awesome. Space is awesome. Time is awesome. Einstein is the greatest mind who ever lived on Earth ! 

Ahem, after all this, they are low on fuel and have to pick between the two remaining planets. Brand wants to go to planet B because the data is better and also because her boyfriend was the one sent to explore it. Cooper wants to go check out planet C (Mann's) because he's still broadcasting. They end up going to planet C. Mann's planet is an icy wasteland with upside down ice mountains. It's beautiful but not very friendly. They revive Mann's from his cryostasis and after a while, we discover that he faked his data so that a team would come for him and he could escape back to Earth. In the least interesting scene of the movie, he tries to kill Cooper and launch his shuttle to go back to the orbital station. Brand and Cooper follow him (the third guy died when Mann blew up his refuge). At the station, Mann tries to dock manually but fails and he dies, taking out a good chunk of the station with him. Cooper miraculously manages to dock but the station is going down fast into the black hole. Cooper saves the day by doing a daring slingshot maneuver using Gargantua's gravity to send them to Planet B (Edmund's). But he didn't tell Brand that in order to do that, he had to sacrifice himself and one of the robots by ditching 2 shuttles to gain weight for the station. 

Cooper falls into the event horizon, the place in the black hole where nothing comes out. He falls for ages in the darkness and eventually ends up in a tesseract (I found out what a tesseract was thanks to this film). That place has apparently been created for him by the 'beings'. He's actually behind Murphy's bookshelf back in his house on Earth but replicated an infinite number of times, showing every moment that place has existed in time. It's a bit metaphysical at this moment. So we find out that the ghost she saw back then was actually his father trying to communicate ! In the Tesseract, Cooper tries to send her now grown up daughter the data collected by the robot in the Event Horizon, the missing data to develop the gravitational propulsion. By pulling gravity strings, he send her the data via morse code by influencing the second hand on her watch. It's a bit 'too much' but at this point, you gotta find a way to finish the movie and even though it seems too much and impossible for us puny humans, what the movie has shown us so far is a scientifically possible future so who knows what could happen ? So we go with it. She solves the code and off screen she develops the engine. 

Cooper dies or at leats he thinks he dies but eventually ends up back at Saturn where he is picked up and wakes up in a space station orbiting Saturn. The station where all of Earth population has escaped thanks to Murphy. Cooper reunites with his daughter who is now super old and almost dying because of time dilation (awesome). After a tearful reunion, he decides to go back into the wormhole to find Brand who is now in the process of colonizing Edmund's planet, a mars-like world (Edmund is dead FYI).

WOW ! That was quite the journey ! Brilliant movie. Did I tell you how mush I love space ? It's fascinating. It's an ode to space this movie. Visually, it is stunning. the wormhole sequence ! The black hole is incredible. And so scary, as all black holes should be. the planets are very cool as well and the space action is beautiful. 

The science behind the whole movie is also awesome and the best part is that all of it seems kinda plausible. It's deep Scifi yes but it's pretty well explained and it kinda makes sense. Well except the wormhole that appears out of nowhere thanks to 'beings' but the rest of the science stuff is great. I read that Nolan hired a Caltech physicist to help. I like when filmmakers do that, when they don't take shortcuts with the science stuff and really research these things. It's the case here and it serves the movie greatly. As an astronomy enthusiast I wasn't put off by all the science stuff and I understood most of it. The Mrs needed some explanation though. The concept of time is the most difficult to comprehend. I won't go into it here cause that deserves its own thread. It's fantastic and I could discuss it all day with scientists. 

Anyway, a truly awesome movie. Loved all of it. 

9/10 

[Fido_le_muet 5,197]

The Game

Watched it yesterday with the Mrs. She told me :"I love this film ! " So I said OK. I'm still unsure if I've seen it before or not. After yesterday, I'm 55% sure I saw it before. 😁

First, Michael Douglas is a damn good actor. He always delivers in all the movies I saw with him. Can't say the same for the rest of the cast, except Sean Penn but I consider his role to be pretty minor. 

So Nicholas Van Orton (Douglas) is a wealthy SOB. He's an investment banker who's kinda mean to everyone. His dad killed himself in his childhood and he's been a d*ck pretty much since then. His brother (Penn) comes to see him for his birthday and offer him a voucher for 'an experience'. He tells him it's for a game cause what can you give to someone who has everything ? 

NVO goes to the San Francisco branch of CRS, the company managing the game and he spends almost a full day filling out forms and doing physicals, which he loves of course... Afterwards he receives a call telling him his application has been declined. He is pissed but thankfully the same night the game begins. He finds a body on his front porch but it's only a creepy clown life sized doll. The guy from his financial news channel that he watches every evening starts to talk directly to him ! He is baffled at first and finds out that there's a camera in the clown. And so, some kind of treasure hunt begins. Seems fun at first but it soon becomes kinda creepy, annoying and very very dangerous ! I'll spare you all the multiples events that occur but basically, he becomes involved in some kind of conspiracy and people from the game company CRS want to kill him. 

Now here's where I think the problem is. It is supposed to be one of these movies with a huge twist that you don't see coming. Now it may be me but I saw the whole thing coming from miles and miles away. Spoilers about the ending to follow.

Spoiler

NVO is sure that he's the target of mercenaries from CRS and has one of their employee (kinda) hostage on a building roof. When he pulls a revolver on her, she's genuinely scared and tells him that it was all fake, that her brother is gonna come through the door for her birthday. And that's what happens except Nicholas shoots him in the gut and he dies ! After that, realising he just killed his brother, he jumps off the roof to his death... except nope ! He lands on a huge matress in the middle of his birthday reception. And everyone's alive and well, including his brother. And pretty much everyone he knew in his life was in on the game (very elaborate game).

That first ending is supposed to make us think it's the real end and that he's lost it completely because of the game. And I'm guessing us, viewers are supposed to be shocked, but I already figured out that there was more to it and I was right. 5 minutes later, the movie offered me what I had been expecting all along. Kinda disappointing... That may be because I saw the movie before but I had no recollection of it when watching it yesterday so...

Otherwise, the tense atmosphere is well made, the plot is also good but sometimes you wonder how certain elements can be staged because you can't predict exactly what someone is gonna do. When people are shooting at them, why are there bullet holes in the walls and objects destroyed if they're using blanks ? And at the end how could they predict he would jump on this side and not another ? 

Anyway it was still a good movie but I was disappointed by that twist ending that I had figured out an hour before... 

6/10

What did you guys think of it ? 

Edited April 10, 2020 by Fido_le_muet

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

dir. George Roy Hill

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is a western directed by George Roy Hill (Thoroughly Modern Millie, The Sting) and starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford as Butch and The Kid respectively.   The film starts with sepia toned silent-film like footage of a train robbery putting us in the time and mood straight away.  We then follow the Hole in the Wall Gang, led by Butch and his right hand man, The Sundance Kid, as they hit trains belonging to the head of the Union Pacific, E.H. Harriman.  The first few go great, but they are ambushed after a botched heist involving too much dynamite by a group of lawmen, hired specifically to hunt down and kill them by Harriman, and only Butch and Sundance survive.  They then go on the run, with a fantastic extended sequence of them frantically riding through the expansive, gorgeously shot landscapes, taking refuge with Sundance's girlfriend, Etta (Katharine Ross), who's a teacher, which comes into play later in the film in a really funny way.

Because of Harriman's crack squad, they decide they can't stay in America, so they head to Bolivia.  There's a brilliant montage here showing their journey from the west, to New York, on to a ship, and then into Bolivia.  It's all done using sepia toned photographs that look like they're from the period, and the way that it's edited along with the brilliant honky-tonk soundtrack by Burt Bacharach gives it more energy and life than most films manage with actual motion.  It perfectly condenses their long journey into a totally entertaining sequence and I'm surprised it hasn't been copied more than it has.  

Once in Bolivia, the boys get back to their bank robbing ways, with the help of Etta, who has now become a fully fledged accomplice.  Her teaching experience comes in handy here, as she has to teach them how to speak Spanish, well at least the phrases that they need, "hands up, backs against the wall."  This whole sequence is brilliant and funny, not in a way that turns the film into a comedy, but funny in a natural, realistic way.  The whole film is like that.  This was written by William Goldman, who is considered one of the greatest screenwriters in Hollywood history, writing films like Marathon Man, All the Presidents' Men, The Princess Bride and Misery, but many consider this his masterpiece.  The two leads are so brilliantly written that you can't help loving them.  If you met them you would join their gang in a second.  This is helped by the brilliant performances by Newman and Redford, whose real life friendship really makes their character's relationship feel real.  All of the scenes of them talking, joking around with each other, feels like you're hanging out having a couple of beers with the lads.

I won't give away the ending, but it is iconic, and totally the ending that Butch and Sundance deserve.  9/10

 

[Sinister 2,578]

On 4/5/2020 at 6:21 AM, LimeGreenLegend said:

Under the Skin

dir. Jonathan Glazer

Scarlett Johansson totally naked.  Now that I have your attention let me tell you about Jonathan Glazer's Under the Skin, a surreal sci-fi/horror film starring Johansson as an alien observing and studying humanity in the towns and countryside of Scotland.  We follow her as she drives around in a van picking up men and taking them back to her home where she traps them in a black void that could be another dimension.  Here they hang suspended until their insides are mush and are eventually s*cked out of them, leaving just the skin behind.  She is aided by a man in riding leathers who never speaks.  He could be her helper or her master, it's never made clear.  About halfway through the film she picks up a man with severe facial disfigurement and this clearly affects her.  After having s*x with him she examines her own face in the mirror, maybe finding her own humanity, and she lets him go.  She then spends the rest of the film searching for more of this humanity before a starkly violent and brutal ending. 

I loved this film.  It's full of startling imagery and is fantastically directed.  It's a very detached, cold feeling film, which fits the idea of an outsider watching their subject.  It also uses hidden cameras and has Johansson interacting with real people who didn't know they were being filmed, again reinforcing the idea of somebody studying and observing these people.  Johansson is fantastic as the alien, playing it very cold, keeping her performance under the surface, but when she does talk you can see flashes of life, something she probably learned from her observations.  The rest of the cast are mostly made up of non-actors, giving a strange reality to what is a very surreal film.  It also makes Johansson feel like more of an outsider.  Here's this incredibly famous a-list actor in a weird art-house sci-fi film set in Scotland.  She feels so out of place, but in a good way that adds to the other-worldliness of her character.  

Even though I loved it, it's still a hard one to recommend.  It's very slow with hardly any plot, and nothing is explained to you.  This film asks more questions than it answers, and I know a lot of people find that annoying.  It is also very light on dialogue, the majority of the film is all about imagery and mood.  Also, not much happens, this is a film about observation, and that's what we get to do.  We watch this character, we're there just as a witness, to take a record of her findings.  You do get to see Johansson naked though, and I know that's more than enough to sway a lot of you perverts 😉 9/10

 

 

After my perfect pick of the Zombie movie, I suggested this one.

I'm no longer allowed to pick movies, lol.

I zoned out after the first few minutes and played Tomb Raider while glancing over at the TV on occasion. I will give it another try at some point though.

Edited April 13, 2020 by Sinister

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

@Sinister it's definitely a divisive movie, totally get the zoning out.  It's more a film about tone and atmosphere, something you need to be absorbed by all the way through to take anything from.

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Lola Rennt (Run Lola Run)

dir. Tom Tykwer 

Run Lola Run is a German experimental thriller written and directed by Tom Tykwer (Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, Cloud Atlas) and starring Franka Potente as the flame haired Lola.  The film starts with Lola getting a phone call from her boyfriend, Manni (Moritz Bleibtreu) telling her that he's lost 100000 marks on the subway, money he needs to give to a drug dealer in 20 minutes or he'll be killed.  This kicks off a relentless series of events as Lola runs through the Berlin streets desperately trying to find the cash.  We see these 20 minutes three times during the film, but they are different each time, seemingly small things that happen to Lola, being tripped over in a stairwell, nearly getting run over by a car, change the outcome of her day dramatically.  

The urgency in the story is reflected in the direction.  This is a high energy film which uses handheld cameras, bright colours contrasted with black and white sequences, split screen scenes and animation to deliver an almost overwhelming experience which is all frenetically edited to a non-stop pounding EDM soundtrack which propels the film forward like it's on rocket skates.  The film is only 80 minutes long, but feels half that because of the way it's been presented.  

The performances are pretty good, but Potente is brilliant as Lola, her frantic desperation coming across perfectly.  I don't have much more to say about this, it's a very simple film with excellent execution and is a breathless ride from start to finish 8/10

 

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Něco z Alenky (Alice) 

dir. Jan Švankmajer

Alice (full Czech title "Something from Alice") is a darkly surreal adaptation of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, written and directed by Jan Švankmajer and starring Kristýna Kohoutová as Alice.  The film is a mixture of live action and stop-motion animation, with Alice being the only human we see (apart from a brief shot of her sister at the start of the film, but we don't see her face) and the only person we hear.  Alice speaks all of the dialogue for every character in the film, as if she were telling us a story, so you'll hear stuff like "oh dear, I'm so late, said the White Rabbit," and "off with her head, screamed the Queen of Hearts."  The film reinforces this idea of Alice telling us this story by cutting to an extreme close up of her mouth when she says the "said the..." part of the sentence, these are all her words and we see her speaking them.  Her performance is also very understated for the most part, selling the dream like quality of the film.  It's like she's in a trance seeing all of these weird things.  

And there are plenty of weird, and mostly disturbing things.  The film starts with Alice telling us directly "Now you will see a film made for children.  Perhaps."  If you want your kids to have nightmares for weeks afterwards, sure.  All of the classic characters are here, the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, the Caterpillar, but they have all been twisted and deformed.  The White Rabbit is a horrific looking taxidermy, sawdust spilling out of his split stitches.  The Hatter is a wooden puppet with nails in his chest which he hangs watches from.  The Caterpillar is a ragged sock puppet who eats some false teeth and eyes out of a jar so it can see and speak.  That's not to mention the slab of meat which wetly slaps around in a pantry, or the collection of skeleton animals and freakish combinations like a fish head on a pair of chicken legs.  The design of these creatures, and the whole film, is incredible.  They all work together to give off a creepy, unsettling atmosphere.

There's also no music, which really brings the brilliant sound design to the fore.  The film is full of echoing drips, grinding gear and ticking clocks.  The crunchy bite of the White Rabbit eating the sawdust he just lost to fill himself back up again is so creepy.  All of these things add up to a nightmarish dream of a film with a perfectly sinister ending which is as far away from the Disney version as you could get.  The best adaptation of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland that you will ever see 9/10 

 

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Oldboy

dir. Park Chan-wook

Oldboy is a Korean revenge movie by Park Chan-wook, part of his revenge trilogy which also includes Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, and Lady Vengeance.  It stars Choi Min-sik as Oh Dae-su, who we see at the beginning of the film drunk off of his *ss in a police station, screaming at the cops, ripping his clothes off and trying to p*ss in a bucket.  He's a mess.  It's also his young daughters birthday, he's a real f*ck-up.  After being bailed out by his best friend he suddenly disappears on a crowded street.  Two months later we find him locked in a room, no idea why he's there, or who put him there.  He goes on to spend the next 15 years there before being released as suddenly as he was taken.  He then sets out on a journey to find out who did this to him, and why.  

This is a fantastic movie that is as intense and shocking now as it was when I first saw it.  Choi gives an incredible performance as Dae-su, totally transforming from a bloated drunken slob into a cold hardened monster who is only interested in revenge.  I won't say anything more about the plot because it is a hell of a ride that will have you on the edge of your seat the whole way through.  There are so many incredible scenes in this film that you will remember long after the credits have finished; his time spent imprisoned, the octopus scene, the tooth extraction, the tongue, and above all, the hallway fight, one of, if not the best fight scene in film history.  These are all beautifully shot with gorgeous cinematography that highlights the sickly green pallor that dominates a vivid colour palette.  

Spike Lee directed a remake starring Josh Brolin about a decade after this was released, and it is awful.  Do yourself a favour and ignore that and watch this instead, this is a totally unforgettable movie 9/10

 

If anyone's interested, I also have a movie music playlist on Spotify that I'll be updating regularly.  It's pretty good, if I do say so myself 😉 

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3J25zFzdG87JP3GNxZNJmn

[DavidCore89 7,402]

The Wanderers (1979).

One of my favourite movies as a child, probably watched it every week and it's still enjoyable.

A 10 year-old me really wanted to be a Wanderer, the movie made a huge impression on me. Little did I know I'd switch allegiances and turn out to be a Baldie 🤷‍♂️

9/10.

[CatManDoza 3,473]

couldn;t sleep last night, remembered the coffee i'd drunk at 9pm playing fortnite and found out why. put a film on to watch at 2 am this morning.

 

just my fave film ever, lost count of how many times i've seen it! love the story, love the actors, love the soundtrack. love love love

18/10

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

The Blues Brothers

dir. John Landis

The Blues Brothers is a musical comedy directed by John Landis (Animal House, An American Werewolf in London) starring John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd as Jake and Elwood Blues, leaders of a rhythm and blues band, now disbanded due to Jake's time in prison.  The movie starts with Jake's release, Elwood picking him up in a battered old cop car he got at an auction because he traded the "bluesmobile" for a mic.  They then visit the orphanage they lived in as children, learning that it is due to be closed down because they don't have $5000 for a tax bill.  After visiting a local church, where they see an incredible performance from the preacher, played by James Brown, Jake sees the light and realises that to get the money they need to get the band back together.  

We then follow them as they recruit all of the old members, running into legendary blues and soul singers along the way including Aretha Franklin as a diner owner, Ray Charles as the owner of a music store, and BB King as BB King just sat in the street playing guitar.  The actual Blues Brothers band is itself made up of incredible musicians of the time, like Matt "Guitar" Murphy and Donald "Duck" Dunn, and even though none of these people are actors they are absolutely brilliant in their respective roles, clearly having a blast making this film.  The real star here is the soundtrack.  First, you have these legends singing some classics, Franklin sings Think, BB King plays Boom Boom, and Cab Calloway, who gives an amazing performance of Minnie the Moocher.  Then you have the Blues Brothers Band themselves, and they are a joy to watch.  Belushi and Aykroyd don't look out of place in front of this amazing band, they really hold their own musically with Belushi's singing and Aykroyd's harmonica playing really showing us how much they love this music.  Whether they're playing blues and soul classics like Sweet Home Chicago or Gimme Some Lovin, or, in one of the best scenes, country songs like Stand by Your Man and The Theme from Rawhide, you can't help but smile and sing and dance along.  @djw180 nominated feelgood films for the film club this month, and if that had won I would've picked this film.

An absolute classic with incredible music, a thousand quotable lines, and a ridiculously huge car chase; and I haven't even mentioned the Illinois n*zis, The Good Ole Boys, or homicidal Carrie Fisher yet.  I defy anyone who says they don't like musicals to watch this and not have a blast (@Con 😉) 10/10

 

======================================

12 Angry Men

dir. Sidney Lumet

12 Angry Men is a courtroom drama, the first film from Sidney Lumet (Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon) and is about the final deliberations of a jury at a murder trial of a young Puerto Rican boy who is accused of killing his father.  It stars Henry Fonda as juror 8 (we only know these characters by their jury number), the lone stand out voting not guilty.  Not because he thinks the boy is innocent, he just thinks they should spend at least an hour talking about it.  We then spend the next 90 minutes in the jury room with these people as conflict and arguments start to happen, not helped by the fact that it's the hottest day of the year and the fan isn't working.  Fonda is amazing as the moral centre of the film, always staying calm and logical, trying to think with his head and not his heart.  His total opposite is juror 3, played by Lee J. Cobb, who is the strongest advocate for a guilty verdict.  He is aggressive and loud and bullying, even though this is in black and white, you can tell his face is bright red for most of the movie.  He also has the best character arc in the film.  I won't spoil anything, because you need to watch this, but his breakdown at the end is heartbreaking.

The other jurors all have their own reasons for voting guilty at first, whether it's prejudice, impatience (one juror has tickets for a baseball game), indecision or ignorance, and these are all played out beautifully not only in the dialogue but in how they all move around each other and the one set of the movie.  It's also shown in how they are all swayed by Fonda's calm logic in different ways and for different reasons.  This is all about human interaction and how we relate to one another.  It's also a film about how one man can make a difference. 

This is a masterpiece of a movie in every way.  If I could physically make you all sit down and watch it I would 10/10

 

Edited April 18, 2020 by LimeGreenLegend

[JuniorChubb 3,359]

 

3 Headed Shark Attack (2015)

This is a sequel to the equally awful 2 Headed Shark Attack.

There are a few laughs at some of the more corny moments, however this movie is so bad that it does not deserve any more words to be wasted on it... 2/10

We are about to embark on Giant Squid vs Giant Shark!

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Snowpiercer

dir. b*ng Joon-ho

Snowpiercer is a Korean dystopian sci-fi film from b*ng Joon-ho (The Host, Parasite) starring an incredible ensemble cast including Chris Evans, John Hurt, Song Kang-ho, Tilda Swinton, Octavia Spencer and Ed Harris.  The film is set in the near future where the world has totally frozen over, killing all life.  The last remnants of humanity survive inside a globe-spanning self-sustaining train, the Snowpiercer.  There is a class divide on the train, with the rich at the front living in relative luxury, and the poor crammed together in the rear of the train.  Evans plays Curtis, a member of the lower class, who leads a revolution in an attempt to take control of the engine at the front of the train, because if you control that, you control the world.

This is a brilliant movie, with a twisted story that really ramps up at the end with some incredible revelations that you won't see coming.  The design of the film is great too, with each carriage of the train having a distinct feel to them, which helps keep it visually interesting, considering that it's all set on a train.  The script is fantastic, with each character feeling real and vital to the story.  The action is brutal, with a night-vision fight being a stand out scene.  

This film shares similar themes with Parasite, but in a totally different genre.  If you want to see a beautifully shot sci-fi film with a gripping story you won't do much better than this.  The best comic book movie Chris Evans has been in 9/10

 

 

[JuniorChubb 3,359]

3 hours ago, LimeGreenLegend said:

Snowpiercer is a Korean dystopian sci-fi film from b*ng Joo

I really enjoyed this Lime, have you seen the Willy Wonka comparisons?

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Just now, JuniorChubb said:

I really enjoyed this Lime, have you seen the Willy Wonka comparisons?

I actually watched that video today! I'll buy it 😄 

[JuniorChubb 3,359]

Just now, LimeGreenLegend said:

I actually watched that video today! I'll buy it 😄 

It’s an amazing theory, and I wouldn’t have had a clue if I didn’t stumble across it whilst on a YouTube wormhole.

[Con 5,703]

Midsommar (2019)

The Awesome: I knew very little about the film going into it, all I knew was it had to do with a couple on the verge of breaking up that attend a festival in Sweden and things go wrong...and I feel it paid off as I did not see anything coming. I was very happy to guess what some of the paintings or plethora of symbols represented while watching it, I was really glad nothing was spoiled for myself when it came to, for the lack of a better term, the clues.  Midsommar went places I was not expecting for a "break-up" film. Great cinematography, it really made you feel drug induced and maybe you were, I won't judge you. Seriously though, some scenes you experience them like the characters and they involve magic mushrooms and the sort, so some moments get trippy and I enjoyed them cause it will be the closest to me taking the real thing these days. I Loved the bright and airy setting for this deliciously crazy story, I mean, one moment we are admiring the daffodils in the meadow and the next moment someone is getting clobbered in the f'n head. Usually sunshine and brightness brings with it a feeling of comfort and safety, but not here, as more bad things happen during the bright daylight than night. The costumes and the few but convincing sets all bring out the cult community to life. The small community really made the entire thing plausible and I think that is where the "horror" is real to me, as i love to immerse myself into other cultures and something like this would be terrifying for sure. The Attestupa scene was phenomenal and felt the gore was well done and credit the effect team as that image of the you know what, hitting the you know what and busting open like that was very realistic, how do i know?  well my morbid curiosity of anatomy has brought me to watch terrible real life videos of such acts and is why I can say the gore was done correctly, although I will add something about it in the negative section. Either way, I was impressed with the realism of the body gore, that was my point. What I felt was awesome was the gradual increase in intensity of the situation as we try and guess what will come next. The film gets increasingly violent at the same time that it gets more melancholy...and that sh*t is what unnerved me. My brain could not digest the images of gore followed by the images of beautiful flowers, architecture, landscapes or the calm explanations of the brutality we just witnessed. The setup and execution is done so well in that attestupa scene that I found myself saying, "f*ck that was horrendous, but it is their tradition, so you gotta kind of accept that it may not be criminal to them.", it forced me to reconcile with the violence I was watching and that was very interesting. This film made me feel uncomfortable because I had no idea where it was going and the subtle increasing violence of the film adds extra dread as we close in on the truth of the entire trip. I get a kick out of filmmakers that love detail and this director's middle name could be "Detail" because both this and Hereditary (2018) are filled with symbols and drawings that serve as clues, now some people don't like these types of "red herrings" or "foreshadowing"  but I think that when done properly  they add so much richness to this type of mystery storytelling and once I realized the film was going to be filled with those touches it had me glued to everything in frame and there is so much to see...the best part was that while I did a decent job at guessing how those clues were going to fit in or foreshadow and what we get is better than I had imagined...like the bear image, if you saw the film, you know what im talking about, imagine knowing about that scene before watching the film,I know it would have ruined that moment's full weight for me and this is why I say, if you have been itching to watch this and don't have a good reason why you haven't, just stop reading this and go watch the film and then come back to the review. 

The Good: I felt the story was well told because I fully bought into the cult's isolated world both literally and figuratively. Cults are known to do whatever the hell they want in their communities and it could take decades before the public is ever made aware of what has really been going on (see Scientology scandals). Cults in America operate and have operated secretly out in the open, now most have no real impact on communities but then there are those that do, like the KKK and Jehova Witnesses, wait, let me stop you ----- I am no way comparing the KKK to the Jehova Witnesses, what I mean is both those cults/groups have had enough members to alter communities through legislation or even force --- I hope that fully clarifies my statement. What i'm saying is if the Branch Davidians were successful on American soil, who is to debate what cults do in other countries or isolated areas like the one we see in the film, in fact the film's location makes the cult more convincing and I could see them having a system in place where every few decades in preparation for the festival every 90 years, why wouldn't you have cult members infiltrate law enforcement giving the cult the ability to manipulate evidence that enables the covering up of rituals that would lead to prosecutions; because it is very clear that some of the rituals are voluntary but others are definitely not. Midsommar is directed by Ari Aster, he directed Hereditary which I really, really liked...and in Midsommar I made a loose association as I felt that Midsommar could have been like a prequel to Hereditary or part of a "cult anthology" in which modern families are affected by these 1,000 year-old cults. For example, I can see the grandmother from Hereditary migrating from Halsingland, Sweden to America (perhaps to unsuccessfully leave the cult or spread it!! oh man, either way is juicy!!) and how innocent people pay for that secrecy. The chemistry between the actors was strong, especially the "bros" they seemed realistic, like they really would hang out with each other and this works when some begin to suspect things but when their close friends says, "hey don't worry", they tend to believe them, just like you and I probably do in real life. I thought the standout was Josh (William Jackson Harper), I think I really bought into his anthropology student character the most as it really felt he wanted to do his thesis and put my safety in him to solve what was happening and help us survive. I really enjoyed the setting of the film and while disappointed to learn that it wasn't shot anywhere near Sweden, I thought Budapest filled in nicely for the enchanted land we are supposed to be in. The locations and the way they were shot gave you a feeling of isolation that was detrimental to selling the illusion that it would be easy to discard evidence or keep the cults practices and secrets hidden.  

The Bad: Now if this was done on purpose by the actress or director, congratulations, you achieved your goal, what I'm talking about is the character Dani (Florence Pugh)...she sucks the happiness out of every scene and while its understandable that she is going through some emotional stuff she lays it on thick causing me to lose empathy and instead I found myself saying..."Oh no here she comes again to cry or be sad again". Florence Pugh is one hell of an actress so my guess is she did that on purpose but its not good when you want the main character to shut up and die. While I appreciate the dark tone associated with what Terri (Klaudia Csanyi) does to herself and the family, I thought it came across as clunky and just odd...now that is saying  A LOT in a film full of odd things. It was just one of the strangest murder-suicide setups I have ever seen. I know the filmmaker wanted to have a shocking start to the film, unlike Hereditary, where the burn is slow and we have to wait a while before we are shaken internally by something on the screen, here he chose to go with this and while haunting, it's hard to believe that was the best he could come up with....no way. And on top of all of that, the story did not need that element whatsoever since Dani already came across as a manic depressant and already had established that Dani wasn't in the most loving of relationships with Christian (Jack Reynor), so the impetus to get away with her boyfriend and try to connect on a deeper level was already there before the sister decides to act out. So basically I didnt think the sister and the family was needed to sell us further on Dani's depressive mental state. The critics that say that the film is insulting to Swedish traditions and communities....have those folks not seen how certain groups of people have been stereotyped or portrayed in films since the invention of motion-pictures? It's all good beautiful people of Sweden, only morons would think what is depicted in the film is what occurs in real life in Sweden or at every Pagan festival around the world. We could switch the film's location to Egypt and it would still make sense. The characters we follow aren't really fleshed out and that is unfortunate because we want to like them but they are two dimensional, all we really learn is that they are anthropology students and how they feel about Dani and Christian's relationship. The kills in the last half of the film are mostly off-screen and I mean, we don't even hear a whimper and while I did see how that added positively to the reveal of their ultimate fates, it made me feel cheated out of the kills. I know I mentioned the gore in the positives, and there was only one thing negative I have to say and it's that i feel we see too much of that corpse from the Attestupa ritual, I mean, we see it like 4-5 times and it totally diminishes that original gut punch as the f'n thing starts to look like the rubber that it's made from and that was unfortunate. I can see why the ending let some casual viewers down...for me it comes down to this comparison, if you watched "The Witch (2015)"...

 

and loved the ending as much as I did, then the end to Midsommar feels less satisfying compared to that despite the endings being somewhat similar, both films are more about the main character's journeys than the end results. The implications in The Witch's ending were far more haunting and frightening.

The Ugly: This film is unfairly despised by people, mainly because they consider it Overrated. What happened is that the film got labeled things like, "scariest film of the year", "real horror"....so naturally, people expect to see monsters or expect to be scared out the theater, but the problem is that Midsommar is not conventional horror, It's strength is in it's shock value-terror not in it's horror tropes. Midsommar is a frightening look at exaggerated cult mythology, the film takes place mostly in the bright daylight and not at night, which is used in horror films to hide the monsters and illicit anxiety. There are some things that leave some questions, like the European couple, the girl's fiancee just decides to go into town without telling her? The use of the hallucinates gives the filmmaker excuses as to why characters didn't react realistically to what was clearly an escalating situation around them. I mean, it works, being drugged up could cause you to feel less concerned but at some point the drugs have to wear off, giving you a few hours of clear thinking. There was one element of the ending I didn't like that much and that was because we see a character arc that feels muddled. What I mean is, the character arc is so abrupt and sudden that it left me wanting to know more. Like who really knew what was going to happen? Did our main female  orchestrate the whole thing with the help from Pelle (Vilhelm Blomgren)? I get why the filmmaker probably left it open for interpretation but it would have been awesome closure. This film is 2+ hours long and if you aren't into the film by the end of the first act, the film will feel like 4+ hours. This is not a fast paced story, it takes it time to unfold, it's a marathon not a sprint. There is one s*x scene that is ruined completely by the most absurd act in a s*x scene in film history...i mean, it made the moment comical when it was just getting creepy, if you saw the film I hope you know what I'm talking about...it is what I called the "Old Helga with the assist moment!!!!!!" LMFAO! Completely changed the tone of the scene for me and while I laughed, it ruined the creepy, dammit. The actual story isn't strong and yet I think this was the point. We are asked to be mere observers and not asked to get lost in the story...I say this because the central break up element is not strong or compelling. 

Final Verdict...4/5... I really liked what this was aiming for and felt it succeeded in telling a cool tale of caution while making me feel like i was tripping on hallucinates. I don't think people have an idea just how many humans go missing every year. Resources are used to find these folks and most never ever turn up, so I don't know why the critics focus on "police would investigate and the cult would have been arrested a long time ago."  Not necessarily, as I mentioned in my positives, the things I felt made the story work and very plausible. "This could never happen!", one critic chimed, and I feel bad for that sheltered soul.  I enjoyed Midsommar because it could have happened to me. Imagine being invited to a Bar Mitzvah and it turns out to be something else!!! This film should not have been labeled a horror movie just because there is body horror in it...that actually did the film a disservice with audiences that expected to see slasher or cover your eyes horror. The film is designed to make you feel uncomfortable and disoriented like the characters and it does that well, it's just that some people won't like that taking the place of the monsters in the shadows. If you plan on watching this...enjoy the eye candy of the subliminal clues throughout and come back and post your thoughts, I'd love to discuss this with people that loved it or hated it. I liked it a lot because it took "The Wicker Man (1973)" concept and improved on it in my opinion. Before I can recommend this film to you, first ask yourself what defines "Horror" for you. I think the film's concept is scary and moments of horror are sprinkled throughout...but the entire film is not Horror and I think that is where it let's some people down. For me, I appreciate horror in any form when it is well done, whether it's physical or psychological and in Midsommar, I got both of those and I enjoyed the uncomfortable ride. You will either Hate it or Love it...I think i loved it cause no other film has done a better job making me feel drugged and did have some great moments where I was like..."Am i seeing that right?"...that made it extra fun even if the story is paper thin. 

-------------------

https://www.naturalreaders.com/online/  

Friendly naturalreaders version for your convenience : 

 

Midsommar (2019)

The Awesome: I knew very little about the film going into it, all I knew was it had to do with a couple on the verge of breaking up that attend a festival in Sweden and things go wrong...and I feel it paid off as I did not see anything coming. I was very happy to guess what some of the paintings or plethora of symbols represented while watching it, I was really glad nothing was spoiled for myself when it came to, for the lack of a better term, the clues.  Midsommar went places I was not expecting for a "break-up" film. Great cinematography, it really made you feel drug induced and maybe you were, I won't judge you. Seriously though, some scenes you experience them like the characters and they involve magic mushrooms and the sort, so some moments get trippy and I enjoyed them cause it will be the closest to me taking the real thing these days. I Loved the bright and airy setting for this deliciously crazy story, I mean, one moment we are admiring the daffodils in the meadow and the next moment someone is getting clobbered in the f'n head. Usually sunshine and brightness brings with it a feeling of comfort and safety, but not here, as more bad things happen during the bright daylight than night. The costumes and the few but convincing sets all bring out the cult community to life. The small community really made the entire thing plausible and I think that is where the horror is real to me, as i love to immerse myself into other cultures and something like this would be terrifying for sure. The Attestupa scene was phenomenal and felt the gore was well done and credit the effect team as that image of the you know what, hitting the you know what and busting open like that was very realistic, how do i know?  well my morbid curiosity of anatomy has brought me to watch terrible real life videos of such acts and is why I can say the gore was done correctly, although I will add something about it in the negative section. Either way, I was impressed with the realism of the body gore, that was my point. What I felt was awesome was the gradual increase in intensity of the situation as we try and guess what will come next. The film gets increasingly violent at the same time that it gets more melancholy...and that sh*t is what unnerved me. My brain could not digest the images of gore followed by the images of beautiful flowers, architecture, landscapes or just the calm explanation of the brutal ritual we just witnessed. The setup and execution is done so well in that scene that I found myself saying, "f*ck that was horrendous, but it is their tradition, so you gotta kind of accept that it may not be criminal to them.", it forced me to reconcile with the violence I was watching and that was very interesting. This film made me feel uncomfortable because I had no idea where it was going and the subtle increasing violence of the film adds extra dread as we close in on the truth of the entire trip. I get a kick out of filmmakers that love detail and this director's middle name could be "Detail" because both this and Hereditary (2018) are filled with symbols and drawings that serve as clues, now some people don't like these types of "red herrings" or "foreshadowing" , but I think that when done properly  they add so much richness to this type of mystery storytelling and once I realized the film was going to be filled with those touches, it had me glued to everything in frame and there is so much to see...the best part was that while I did a decent job at guessing how those clues were going to fit in or foreshadow, what we get is better than I had imagined...like the bear image, if you saw the film, you know what im talking about, imagine knowing about that scene before watching the film,I know it would have ruined that moment's full weight for me and this is why I say, if you have been itching to watch this and don't have a good reason why you haven't, just stop reading this and go watch the film and then come back to the review. 

The Good: I felt the story was well told because I fully bought into the cult's isolated world both literally and figuratively. Cults are known to do whatever the hell they want in their communities and it could take decades before the public is ever made aware of what has really been going on (see Scientology scandals). Cults in America operate and have operated secretly out in the open, now most have no real impact on communities but then there are those that do, like the KKK and Jehova Witnesses, wait, let me stop you ----- I am no way comparing the KKK to the Jehova Witnesses, what I mean is both those cults/groups have had enough members to alter communities through legislation or even force --- I hope that fully clarifies my statement. What i'm saying is if the Branch Davidians were successful on American soil, who is to debate what cults do in other countries or isolated areas like the one we see in the film, in fact the film's location makes the cult more convincing and I could see them having a system in place where every few decades in preparation for the festival every 90 years, why wouldn't you have cult members infiltrate law enforcement giving the cult the ability to manipulate evidence that enables the covering up of rituals that would lead to prosecutions; because it is very clear that some of the rituals are voluntary but others are definitely not. Midsommar is directed by Ari Aster, he directed Hereditary which I really, really liked...and in Midsommar I made a loose association as I felt that Midsommar could have been like a prequel to Hereditary or part of a "cult anthology" in which modern families are affected by these 1,000 year-old cults. For example, I can see the grandmother from Hereditary migrating from Halsingland, Sweden to America (perhaps to unsuccessfully leave the cult or spread it!! oh man, either way is juicy!!) and how innocent people pay for that secrecy. The chemistry between the actors was strong, especially the "bros" they seemed realistic, like they really would hang out with each other and this works when some begin to suspect things but when their close friends says, "hey don't worry", they tend to believe them, just like you and I probably do in real life. I thought the standout was Josh (William Jackson Harper), I think I really bought into his anthropology student character the most as it really felt he wanted to do his thesis and put my safety in him to solve what was happening and help us survive. I really enjoyed the setting of the film and while disappointed to learn that it wasn't shot anywhere near Sweden, I thought Budapest filled in nicely for the enchanted land we are supposed to be in. The locations and the way they were shot gave you a feeling of isolation that was detrimental to selling the illusion that it would be easy to discard evidence or keep the cults practices and secrets hidden.  

The Bad: Now if this was done on purpose by the actress or director, congratulations, you achieved your goal, what I'm talking about is the character Dani (Florence Pugh)...she sucks the happiness out of every scene and while its understandable that she is going through some emotional stuff, she lays it on thick making causing me to lose empathy and instead found myself saying..."Oh no here she comes again to cry or be sad again". Florence Pugh is one hell of an actress so my guess is she did that on purpose but its not good when you want the main character to shut up and die. While I appreciate the dark tone associated with what Terri (Klaudia Csanyi) does to herself and the family, I thought it came across as clunky and just odd...now that is saying  A LOT in a film full of odd things. It was just one of the strangest murder-suicide setups I have ever seen. I know the filmmaker wanted to have a shocking start to the film, unlike Hereditary, where the burn is slow and we have to wait a while before we are shaken internally by something on the screen, here he chose to go with this and while haunting, it's hard to believe that was the best he could come up with....no way. And on top of all of that, the story did not need that element whatsoever since Dani already came across as a manic depressant and already had established that Dani wasn't in the most loving of relationships with Christian (Jack Reynor), so the impetus to get away with her boyfriend and try to connect on a deeper level was already there before the sister decides to act out. So basically I didnt think the sister and the family was needed to sell us further on Dani's depressive mental state. The critics that say that the film is insulting to Swedish traditions and communities....have those folks not seen how certain groups of people have been stereotyped or portrayed in films since the invention of motion-pictures? It's all good beautiful people of Sweden, only morons would think what is depicted in the film is what occurs in real life in Sweden or at every Pagan festival. We could switch the film's location to Egypt and it would still make sense. The characters we follow aren't really fleshed out and that is unfortunate because we want to like them but they are two dimensional, all we really learn is that they are anthropology students and how they feel about Dani and Christian's relationship. The kills in the last half of the film are mostly off-screen and I mean, we don't even hear a whimper and while I did see how that added positively to the reveal of their ultimate fates, it made me feel cheated out of the kills. I know I mentioned the gore in the positives, and there was only one thing negative I have to say and it's that i feel we see too much of that corpse from the Attestupa ritual, I mean, we see it like 4-5 times and it totally diminishes that original gut punch as the f'n thing starts to look like the rubber that it's made from and that was unfortunate. I can see why the ending let some casual viewers down...for me it comes down to this comparison, if you watched "The Witch (2015)"... spoiler deleted.

The Ugly: This film is unfairly despised by people, mainly because they consider it Overrated. What happened is that the film got labeled things like, "scariest film of the year", "real horror"....so naturally, people expect to see monsters or expect to be scared out the theater, but the problem is that Midsommar is not conventional horror, It's strength is in it's shock value-terror not in it's horror tropes. Midsommar is a frightening look at exaggerated cult mythology, the film takes place mostly in the bright daylight and not at night, which is used in horror films to hide the monsters and illicit anxiety. There are some things that leave some questions, like the European couple, the girl's fiancee just decides to go into town without telling her? The use of the hallucinates gives the filmmaker excuses as to why characters didn't react realistically to what was clearly an escalating situation around them. I mean, it works, being drugged up could cause you to feel less concerned but at some point the drugs have to wear off, giving you a few hours of clear thinking. There was one element of the ending I didn't like that much and that was because we see a character arc that feels muddled. What I mean is, the character arc is so abrupt and sudden that it left me wanting to know more. Like who really knew what was going to happen? Did our main female  orchestrate the whole thing with the help from Pelle (Vilhelm Blomgren)? I get why the filmmaker probably left it open for interpretation but it would have been awesome closure. This film is 2+ hours long and if you aren't into the film by the end of the first act, the film will feel like 4+ hours. This is not a fast paced story, it takes it time to unfold, it's a marathon not a sprint. There is one s*x scene that is ruined completely by the most absurd act in a s*x scene in film history...i mean, it made the moment comical when it was just getting creepy, if you saw the film I hope you know what I'm talking about...it is what I called the "Old Helga with the assist moment!!!!!!" LMFAO! Completely changed the tone of the scene for me and while I laughed, it ruined the creepy, dammit.

Final Verdict...4/5... I really liked what this was aiming for and felt it succeeded in telling a cool tale of caution while making me feel like i was tripping on hallucinates. I don't think people have an idea just how many humans go missing every year. Resources are used to find these folks and most never ever turn up, so I don't know why the critics focus on "police would investigate and the cult would have been arrested a long time ago."  Not necessarily, as I mentioned in my positives, the things I felt made the story work and very plausible. "This could never happen!", one critic chimed, and I feel bad for that sheltered soul.  I enjoyed Midsommar because it could have happened to me. Imagine being invited to a Bar Mitzvah and it turns out to be something else!!! This film should not have been labeled a horror movie just because there is body horror in it...that actually did the film a disservice with audiences that expected to see slasher or cover your eyes horror. The film is designed to make you feel uncomfortable and disoriented like the characters and it does that well, it's just that some people won't like that taking the place of the monsters in the shadows. If you plan on watching this...enjoy the eye candy of the subliminal clues throughout and come back and post your thoughts, I'd love to discuss this with people that loved it or hated it. I liked it a lot because it took "The Wicker Man (1973)" concept and improved on it in my opinion. Before I can recommend this film to you, first ask yourself what defines "Horror" for you. I think the film's concept is scary and moments of horror are sprinkled throughout...but the entire film is not Horror and I think that is where it let's some people down. For me, I appreciate horror in any form when it is well done, whether it's physical or psychological and in Midsommar, I got both of those and I enjoyed the uncomfortable ride. You will either Hate it or Love it...I think i loved it cause no other film has done a better job making me feel drugged and did have some great moments where I was like..."Am i seeing that right?"...that made it extra fun.

 

Edited April 21, 2020 by Con

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Great review @Con, been missing these write ups of yours, seeing less of them these days, understandable why though.

Have you seen the film Apostle? I watched it a few weeks ago and it's very similar to Midsommar/The Witch/The Wicker Man.  I thought it was decent.

[Con 5,703]

9 minutes ago, LimeGreenLegend said:

Great review @Con, been missing these write ups of yours, seeing less of them these days, understandable why though.

Have you seen the film Apostle? I watched it a few weeks ago and it's very similar to Midsommar/The Witch/The Wicker Man.  I thought it was decent.

I’ll have to check it out. When you see a gap between my reviews it just means I’ve gotten busy at work. Lmao. And get caught up doing other things at home. 

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

Bugsy Malone

dir. Alan Parker

Bugsy Malone is a prohibition-era gangster musical, the debut film from Alan Parker (Fame, Pink Floyd's The Wall), with the big gimmick of having an all-child cast, the leads being played by Scott Baio and Jodie Foster.  The story follows Bugsy Malone, a smooth talking ex-boxing promoter and small time crook, who gets involved with gangster Fat Sam Staccetto and his turf war with Dandy Dan.  Their war has just entered a new violent phase thanks the the brand new invention, the splurge gun, which can fire whipped cream at a terrifying rate.  This is basically the same plot as the original Scarface (1932) but with splurge guns instead of Tommy guns.  Caught up in all of this are a whole cast of brilliant characters like Foster's Tallulah, the star act at Fat Sam's Speakeasy, Blousy Brown, a tough but sweet out of towner with dreams of Hollywood and Bugsy's love interest, and Knuckles, Fat Sam's idiotic henchman.  For the most part the cast are really good, especially Foster and Baio, and once you get wrapped up in the story and the music you really forget that they're all kids acting like adults.

The music in this film is fantastic, really evoking the jazzy ragtime feel of the period, along with a couple of surprisingly mournful songs like Tomorrow and the title track Bugsy Malone.  My personal favourites are Fat Sam's Grand Slam, Bad Guys and You Give a Little Love.  The direction isn't anything special, but there's a real energy in the musical scenes that really propels the film forward.  The script is great, hitting all of the conventions and cliches of 30s gangster and noir films in a way that doesn't feel like a rip off, this is a loving homage.  The set design and costumes are fantastic and really sell the period.

If you don't like musicals, and if kids annoy you, you probably won't like this, but if you give it a chance you'll find a weird concept executed with skill and an infectious enthusiasm 9/10

 

 

[CatManDoza 3,473]

3 minutes ago, LimeGreenLegend said:

Bugsy Malone

dir. Alan Parker

Bugsy Malone is a prohibition-era gangster musical, the debut film from Alan Parker (Fame, Pink Floyd's The Wall), with the big gimmick of having an all-child cast, the leads being played by Scott Baio and Jodie Foster.  The story follows Bugsy Malone, a smooth talking ex-boxing promoter and small time crook, who gets involved with gangster Fat Sam Staccetto and his turf war with Dandy Dan.  Their war has just entered a new violent phase thanks the the brand new invention, the splurge gun, which can fire whipped cream at a terrifying rate.  This is basically the same plot as the original Scarface (1932) but with splurge guns instead of Tommy guns.  Caught up in all of this are a whole cast of brilliant characters like Foster's Tallulah, the star act at Fat Sam's Speakeasy, Blousy Brown, a tough but sweet out of towner with dreams of Hollywood and Bugsy's love interest, and Knuckles, Fat Sam's idiotic henchman.  For the most part the cast are really good, especially Foster and Baio, and once you get wrapped up in the story and the music you really forget that they're all kids acting like adults.

The music in this film is fantastic, really evoking the jazzy ragtime feel of the period, along with a couple of surprisingly mournful songs like Tomorrow and the title track Bugsy Malone.  My personal favourites are Fat Sam's Grand Slam, Bad Guys and You Give a Little Love.  The direction isn't anything special, but there's a real energy in the musical scenes that really propels the film forward.  The script is great, hitting all of the conventions and cliches of 30s gangster and noir films in a way that doesn't feel like a rip off, this is a loving homage.  The set design and costumes are fantastic and really sell the period.

If you don't like musicals, and if kids annoy you, you probably won't like this, but if you give it a chance you'll find a weird concept executed with skill and an infectious enthusiasm 9/10

 

 

bloody hell aint seen this film in years!!! used to be my go to film every weekend recorded off of bbc or the like!! minght stick it on in bed this eve

[LimeGreenLegend 4,175]

1 minute ago, CatManDoza said:

bloody hell aint seen this film in years!!! used to be my go to film every weekend recorded off of bbc or the like!! minght stick it on in bed this eve

one of my favourites when I was a kid.  I used to have the biggest crush on Jodie Foster when I was 10 😄 

[CatManDoza 3,473]

4 minutes ago, LimeGreenLegend said:

one of my favourites when I was a kid.  I used to have the biggest crush on Jodie Foster when I was 10 😄 

Yep, I know that feeling

[Con 5,703]

24 minutes ago, LimeGreenLegend said:

Bugsy Malone

If you don't like musicals, and if kids annoy you, you probably won't like this

[Con 5,703]

1 hour ago, LimeGreenLegend said:

Great review @Con, been missing these write ups of yours, seeing less of them these days, understandable why though.

Have you seen the film Apostle? I watched it a few weeks ago and it's very similar to Midsommar/The Witch/The Wicker Man.  I thought it was decent.

Be honest...did you chuckle or cringe at the "Assist from Helga" scene i mentioned in the Midsommar review.